Greetings,
Does anyone know what the emitter/driver situation is for the LED Mag Solitaire?
On this forum, I have seen Luxeon C, Z, CZ, and Rebel.
However, all of these bottom out at about 2.5 volts. So unless there is a tiny voltage booster (doubtful) in the flashlight, this probably isn’t accurate.
Anyone have any ideas?
Thanks,
-fjfj765
White LEDs require at least around 3V or a little higher. A simple boost circuit can be made really small and will fit in the flashlight without problems. Another possibility is to use a Li-ion battery (but it would still require some form of current limiting – or better: current regulation).
Solitaire LED is driven off a single AAA battery.
I really doubt there is a tiny boost circuit in there, but I’ve been wrong before.
well..the peak Eiger definitely has a boost circuit in there, and while it’s large for an AAA light, the head is still pretty darn small…that one runs an xpg, so it stands to reason that if the average “white” LED requires at least 2.5 Vf, then there is likely a boost driver in there…
That’d be very convenient then - I could just rip out the original booster circuit, throw in a current limiting resistor, and not have to futz about with putting in a new emitter for my 10440 mod.
What do you want out of the 10440 mod? If you want more power, the stock LED and the heatsinking just won’t do it.
The above posts are correct: white LEDs (really blue LEDs underneath) require around 2.4V to begin to light up, so a boost driver must be used. Efficiency aside, these boosters can be made extremely small.
The goal for the 10440 mod is longer run time, and if that means slightly higher brightness as a side effect, that’s fine.
Stock Mag Solitaire claims 47 lumens. Enough for my purposes. I wouldn’t be upset if it was a tad brighter, but that’s not as important as runtime to me.
Also, 10440 superior to alkaleak due to rechargability. Before someone mentions it, I don’t want to futz with eneloops because that’ll mean shorter runtime (we’re trying to avoid that)
Before someone mentions lithium primary 1.5v cells - in AAA form factor they suck. With fairly moderate usage (1 cycle every 3 weeks) I killed 3/4 EBL’s I bought. They also had quite a bit less runtime than alkaleaks. No thanks.
You might want to rethink this one. One can double/triple the runtime just by switching from Alkaline to NiMH.
Eneloop white aaa claims 800mAh capacity.
Let’s just take this figure at face value.
1.2v*0.8Ah=0.96Wh
My usual Kirkland alkaleaks tested at 0.88Ah
1.5*0.88=1.32Wh
Vapcell claims 450mAh on their high capacity 10440s. They claim a minimum capacity of 420mAh. Let’s say they’re overselling the minimum capacity by 10% - so 378mAh, which we’ll round down to 370mAh.
3.6*.37=1.332Wh
So even if we are very pessemistic about the performance of the 10440, it (on paper) outperforms the alkaleaks, which (on paper) outperforms the eneloop.
There’s your mistake, they won’t run at 1.5V all the time. Actually the voltage will drop pretty quickly.
The numbers don’t usually reflect real world performance though. I don’t doubt that the 10440 has more energy. But I remember building lights with LEDs on the Maglite platform. Common wisdom was the NiMH was far superior. Simply because the voltage sag was so much less than alkaline cells. I measured back then (albeit maybe crudely). I would get at minimum twice the runtime at equivalent brightness out of NiMH cells. Those rated at 10 amp hours (actually testing closer to 9000 mAh at an amp draw), over the alkaline cells rated at 12 Ah.
Energy might still be in those alkaline cells, but it is useless because the voltage drops below 1 volt per cell under load.
If you get the light going, try doing your own testing. I think you will be surprised.
Though, if you can live with the drawbacks of the LiIon cells, yes they are the energy king. But it probably makes less difference than you think in the real world.
I just looked at my results again… The alkaleak actually tested at 0.88Wh, not Ah.
So y’all are right. Even on paper - alkaleak = garbage.
While slightly outdated now, this HKJ AAA/AA Battery comparison charts is a good resource.
Alkaline cells are towards the bottom of the list, comparing eneloop AAA Vs duracel ultra AAA, it appears the eneloop “wins” at all currents 0.2A and above.
EBL’s are garbage too .
Yep - as I said, primary worse than an alkaleak
I spotted your new thread about E21a - I know you’re desperate for 10440s but I suspect a 10440 resistor “driven” light would actually have less runtime than one with a boost circuit and AAA NiMh…
While you’re looking to get involved with some modding, how about an E3A resistor mod to tide you over until you get the Solitaire project sorted? It runs on AAA but you can choose output/runtime by the resistor you select.
Addressed runtime towards the end of this post:
Maglite Solitaire is the only flashlight I’ve really liked. I like the twisty top a lot, and I use lantern mode very often. It’s light enough that I can hold it in my mouth (yes, I know it’s gross, but it’s too convenient), and I’ve glued a Streamlight pocket/hat clip to it to make it almost perfect. It’s also dim enough that I can actually use it in the dark without being dazzled. It just needs better runtime and higher CRI.
So unfortunately, I am very set in my ways, and don’t want another flashlight. The E3A looks like a perfectly cromulent flashlight, but it’s not a Mag Solitaire. If I lost my Mag Solitaire today, I’d buy another one immediately.
As always, devil is in details. With a resistor you will destroy that little advantage li ion has. resistor will waste and burn extra voltage turning it into heat. if it was a high efficiency driver , then your calculation would be more or less valid, but with a resistor you’ll actually make it worse.
My calculation is accounting for the resistor.
In series, current is constant across the circuit.
We know that the current is 125ma, and the battery voltage is 3.6v. Thus, .125*3.6=0.45w. This calculation takes the resistor loss into account.
